Capitol Ideas: Dues & Don'ts
Bethell, Tom
"Capitol Ideas: Dues & Don'ts" by Tom Bethell Dues & Don'ts An apparently minor move on the chess board can sometimes be more aggressive than it looks. There's an opportunity for the Republicans to make just such...
...They are mostly in the South, Midwest, and West...
...Over the last 12 months, it's helped the Fund deliver a return of 35.54...
...But it TOM BETHELL is The American Spectator's Washington correspondent...
...But Congress did nothing to implement it, and President Bush made no move to do so until 1992...
...Revenue losses from the decline of membership were offset "by raising dues, fees, fines and assessments," Bennett says...
...External revenues have also flowed into union coffers...
...Besides, Republicans are not accustomed to playing offense...
...if violence is threatened, a Supreme Court interpretation of the Hobbes Act, the federal anti-extortion statute, has served to keep federal law-enforcement at arms length...
...Unions are hostile to free trade and to technological innovation...
...The Los Angeles Times reported that the United Steel Workers put 52 paid staffers to work full-time for Harris Wofford's 1991 victorious Senate campaign in Pennsylvania...
...By comparison, all other political action committees spent about $190 million combined...
...Those who support unions should be free to do so, in the expectation that violence will be punished...
...20 February 1996 • The American Spectator...
...The withdrawal of forced dues would put the whole organized labor movement on the defensive...
...18 February 1996 - The American Spectator "As the manager of the anhattam Fund, I love growth stocks...
...Today, it is estimated that there are 10 million private-sector union members...
...They would no longer have vast amounts of money left over to engage in their current range of political action...
...Those who try to withhold their dues can be fired...
...Investment returns and principal fluctuate...
...Manhattan Fund Average Annual Total Returns For Periods Ended 9/30/95 35.54% 19.26% 15.79% 17.82% Life of Fund* 1 year 5 year 10 year *Neuberger & Berman Management Inc...
...Please read it carefully before you invest...
...Redemption proceeds may be higher or lower than original cost...
...Between 196o and 1993, forced-dues stateslost 1.4 million high-paying manufacturing jobs, while right-to-work states gained 2.7 million such jobs...
...became investment adviser to the predecessor of this Fund on 3/1/79...
...Unions have done all in their power to prevent companies from hiring new workers to replace strikers, and are effectively shielded from the federal investigation of violent activities, if it can be argued that these activities serve a legitimate union purpose —such as raising wages...
...That is why unionism has flourished in the public (compulsory) sector, and in countries such as Germany where the law is even more rigged, permitting industry-wide union organizing...
...The little noted point is that unions are organizations whose activities seem to be directed against management but in fact are hostile to competing labor...
...Companies are also compelled by law to bargain with unions "in good faith," and to make their property available for union use...
...Heflin forgets that forced dues are used in ceaseless efforts to roll back state right-to-work laws...
...In 1947 a provision of the Taft-Hartley Act modified the Wagner Act, giving rise to today's "right-to-work" states...
...Call Neuberger & Berman Management Inc...
...There is much more that needs to be said about the union world, with its culture of grievance, and its absence of external purpose, like a ship that exists for the benefit of the crew...
...Such dues now average about $645 annually, according to an estimate by the National Right to Work Committee, the organization that is leading this reform attempt...
...Legislation now pending before the Senate, called the National Right to Work Act of 1996, would repeal the provision of the 1935 labor law that forces workers in unionized companies to pay union dues...
...But first they must find the courage to play offense...
...Longshoremen fought containers and auto-workers opposed robots...
...Now that they control Congress, Republicans have a chance to address these questions...
...Full-time staff members still on union payrolls are assigned to political campaigns...
...There was a tremendous stir in 1981 when it was rumored that President Reagan might try to do something about the antitrust exemption...
...Howell Heflin of Alabama has opposed changing the law on the grounds that it would hurt the comparative advantage now enjoyed by right-to-work states, such as his own...
...01996 Neuberger & Berman Management Inc., Distributor...
...At Neuberger & Berman Manhattan Fund, we search for growth stocks that are under-researched or temporarily out of favor with Wall Street...
...Right-to-work and compulsory-dues states, side by side, allow us to observe the economic costs of compulsory unionism...
...Liberals have long understood that embarrassment is one of the most effective weapons in politics...
...Moreover, airline and railroad workers, who are covered by the Railroad Labor Act, not the NLRA, are not reached by state right-to-work provisions...
...Call 1-800-877-9700, ext...
...In Strike, his book on the trade union war against the New York Daily News, Richard Vigilante mentioned the hatred of work, "the opposition to reform, the relentless fight for turf, the petty sabotage against any attempt by management to assert itself...
...no one is prepared to say by how much, but possibly by half or more...
...If it does, it will certainly be vetoed by President Clinton, who is well aware of the many services that organized labor has rendered both to the Democratic Party and to his own election...
...Ten days after Bill Clinton took office, this insignificant order was revoked, and the notices were removed...
...Strikers should be free to strike—knowing full well that someone else will be free to replace them...
...CAPITOL IDEAS by Tom Bethell Dues &Don'ts An apparently minor move on the chess board can sometimes be more aggressive than it looks...
...The same bill was introduced by Rep...
...We have heard a great deal about how their membership has declined since the 1950's — down to about n percent of the private sector workforce, less than half what it was...
...We have heard less about the still disproportionate influence of unions, their access to funds coercively extracted from workers, and their sustained political clout...
...The GOP, by contrast, has tended to think it unsporting...
...His instinct is to take Democratic initiatives and make a deal, find the tactful compromise, and support the president...
...Introduced last spring by Sen...
...Legislators have rarely had to go on the record either supporting or opposing its least democratic provision: the forced payment of dues...
...The subject at hand is labor unions...
...The money is spent overwhelmingly on Democratic candidates...
...The National Labor Relations Act, sometimes called the Wagner Act, which also brought into being the National Labor Relations Board, was passed in 1935 in an unrecorded voice vote...
...After all, the owners and employees of Neuberger & Berman and their families have over $100 million of their own money invested in our mutual funds...
...The all-important move is to bring it up for a vote, and that of course is where Senator Dole comes in...
...In recent years, union strategists have spent about $450 million per federal election cycle...
...But it is estimated that compulsory union dues amount to about $4.9 billion a year...
...According to one poll, 77 percent favor abolishing compulsory dues, including 58 percent of union households...
...Government salaries today are as high as they are because the taxes needed to support such dead-weight institutions as the Department of Housing and Urban Development are compulsory...
...Performance before the Fund's August 1993 reorganization is for its predecessor...
...In the final two weeks of the 1992 presidential campaign, the National Education Association loaned one-fifth of its national staff to the Clinton-Gore campaign for round-the-clock workin the final stretch...
...Mark Goldstein, Portfolio Manager, Neuberger & Berman Manhattan Fund, A No-Load Capital Appreciation Fund...
...Or, on AOL, keyword: Neuberger...
...NeubergereBerman MANHATTAN FUNDs If we don't invest in it, why should you...
...Between 1960 and 1987, in fact, the "price" of union membership more than doubled...
...They would rather not be forced to vote either for it or against it...
...Statistics are hard to come by, because the rigorous reporting requirements that affect most other organizations do not necessarily apply to labor unions...
...3632...
...In all the major industrial states, including New York, Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, and California, dues are compulsorily paid by those who did not vote to join the union...
...The only way unions can exercise countervailing power is to hold their members' feet to the fire...
...Bob Goodlatte of Virginia in the House, where it has forty-seven co-sponsors...
...David Bonior received $310,000 in union PAC money in 1993-94, but this is just the reported tip of the unreported union iceberg...
...It is said that the Supreme Court partially addressed the problem by ruling in Beck v. Communication Workers (1988) that dues could not be spent on anything except expenses directly related to union representation...
...If the whole country became right-to-work, as it would under the new bill, the amount of money available to unions for political activities would sharply decline...
...Of course, we're very pleased...
...Republicans have been well trained to think that political capital is something that should be risked only when victory is assured...
...In Oregon the AFL-CIO recently increased its union dues as part of a campaign to fight the proposed change in the law...
...is one of those proposals that is more popular with the people than it is inside the Beltway...
...for a prospectus containing more information...
...Pressed by Pat Buchanan in the primaries, Bush finally directed the Labor Department to post notices informing employees of their rights...
...Unions are plush enough to turn over a lot of money to political activity not related to union organizing...
...james T. Bennett of George Mason University has pointed out that although private sector union membership dropped sharply between the mid 1970's and the late 1980's, "total financial resources available to private sector unions remained virtually unchanged...
...They are exempt from antitrust prosecution, even though their sole purpose is to drive up the price of labor by restricting its supply...
...But I don't believe love should be blind...
...Somewhat similar arguments have been made by Fred Thompson of Tennessee and Larry Craig of Idaho, who say the problem should be addressed at the state level...
...Lauch Fair-cloth of North Carolina, the bill has eighteen co-sponsors in the Senate, including Phil Gramm...
...The bill is not expected to pass in this Congress...
...only two large states, Florida and Texas, are among them...
...Today, twenty-one states have a right-to-work provision...
...As Martin Fox of the National Right to Work Committee said, this is like lashing galley slaves to row harder—to escape the boat come to rescue them...
...For that reason, bringing it up for a vote would put a number of lawmakers on the spot...
...Past performance is no guarantee of future results...
...There's an opportunity for the Republicans to make just such a move now, and the man to make it is Bob Dole...
...We call it "Growth at a Reasonable Price...
...But the problem resides in the federal law, and that is where it should be addressed...
...What thismeans is that if a labor union succeeds in "organizing" a company in such a state, by getting 5o percent plus one of its workers to agree to be represented by that union, those workers who do not agree do not have to pay union dues...
...They have failed to grasp that, in politics, it is not lost but accumulated in making principled efforts, win or lose...
...Adjusted for inflation, union receipts went from $10.7 billion to $10.4 billion at a time when the membership itself declined from 16.2 million to 10.9 million...
...David Bonior's brigades would not have the luxury of carping about Newt Gingrich's GOPAC because, once reduced to voluntary contributions, they would have to figure out where their next Is the GOP still afraid of a right-to-work USA...
...Most of the $450 million is what is called "soft" money, and is not reported as campaign spending...
...The coercion which unions have been permitted to exercise, contrary to all principles of freedom under the law, is primarily the coercion of fellow workers," Friedrich Hayek wrote...
...The federal government is a major source of income —over $1 billion, by one estimate—with monies for job training and other programs coming from the Department of Labor and from the National Endowment for Democracy...
...The business end of union activity is at the factory gate...
...Competition is the great enemy of unionism, because if the union drives the price of labor too high, goods will become more expensive and customers will go elsewhere (if they have the choice...
...For Bob Dole, it would go against the habit of a lifetime...
...The quiet move on the chess board could ultimately put all that in jeopardy...
...As Secretary of Labor Robert Reich candidly acknowledged in 1985, "In order to maintain themselves, unions have got to have some ability to strap their members to the mast...
...Unions are the creations of legal privilege and probably would not survive without it...
...dollar was coming from...
Vol. 29 • February 1996 • No. 2
